


Every Little Thing

by netherooze (Raelien)



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: (also briefly) - Freeform, (briefly) - Freeform, Bottom Billy Hargrove, Collections - Freeform, Drabbles, Epistolary, Fluff, M/M, oneshots
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-02-20
Updated: 2018-02-20
Packaged: 2019-03-17 23:50:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 4,451
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13669893
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Raelien/pseuds/netherooze
Summary: A Harringrove-centric compilation of (predominantly) standalone short works ranging from fluff to angst to smut and plenty in between. Tags added as needed with each update. Index in beginning notes.Latest Addition(*Added as the new Chapter 1):Graduation is fast approaching, and there’s a conversation Steve can’t put off any longer.





	1. Checkpoint (Oneshot)

**Author's Note:**

> **Chapter Index**  
>  **1\. Checkpoint** (Oneshot) - Graduation is fast approaching, and there’s a conversation Steve can’t put off any longer.  
>  **2\. First Attempt, Left in Locker** (Epistolary) - Billy writes Steve an honest-to-god apology card—or at least he tries to. (The author's epistolary art project)  
>  **3\. Bits & Pieces** (Collection of Five Standalone Drabbles) - **I.** Steve is just a little slow on the uptake, but he figures it's better late than never, right? **II.** Billy supposes graduation won't be as much of a drag as it could be, since at least he'll have Steve there with him. As it turns out, Steve isn't all he has. **III.** The boys establish their first holiday tradition, but not without putting their own spin on a classic. **IV.** Neil Hargrove receives some mail. One particular envelope sticks out among the bills and advertisements. **V.** Steve finds that, under the right circumstances, he really doesn't mind taking direction. (NSFW)  
>  **4\. An Observation** (Oneshot) - Steve has been certain Billy Hargrove detests everything about him—but a friend makes a pretty good case for an alternate theory.
> 
> Unless otherwise noted, all works are standalone and posted in no particular order.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Graduation is fast approaching, and there’s a conversation Steve can’t put off any longer. (Fourth installment uploaded, but serving as the new Part 1)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you've visited this work previously, the oneshot below is the newest update. It was actually the fourth installment posted to this compilation, but since I was dissatisfied with a drabble collection serving as part one, I've changed things up a bit.
> 
> Enjoy!

The last bell rang two Fridays before finals week, and when Steve collected his books and followed the throng of students out the main doors, it was with a single resolution on his mind.

He spotted Billy standing halfway across the parking lot, already leaned back against the Camaro with a cigarette in one hand and an folded-open notebook, which he seemed to be idly reviewing, in the other. After calling a loud  _ ‘Hargrove!’ _ to catch his attention, Steve made a universal ‘get over here’ gesture, exaggerated enough to be recognized across the distance.

Billy shrugged and moved to toss the notebook into his car before starting toward the building.

Steve turned toward the door as Billy approached and fell into step alongside him, greeting Steve with a questioning sort of grunt.

“Thought you might wanna hit your locker again before we head out,” Steve explained. “Overheard Miller telling Warren’s sub earlier—they’re pulling an end-of-the-year locker sweep on Monday. One last ‘fuck you’ to the potheads and the guys hiding their porn stashes from their folks.”

Billy gave a lazy shrug of concession, just a raising of eyebrows and considering tilt of the head, and led the way back inside. They both knew that Billy had found himself in the latter category for the past few weeks.

“You give your boy Byers a heads-up yet?”

Steve gave a short chuckle they pushed past some of the dwindling crowd of students headed in the opposite direction. Once they were clear, he responded, with an absent shake of his head, “No clue on the porn front and I don’t wanna know, but y'know the guy actually doesn’t smoke weed?”

Billy slowed his pace a little and leveled him with a Look. It was one that, to Steve, always seemed to say, ‘What just came out of your mouth is so dumb that, had anyone else said it, it would be clear they were joking, but it was you who said it, Steve, so now I’m not sure. Also, you’re lucky I somehow find your dopeyness appealing.’ He’d privately sworn it was the one expression Billy and Nancy shared to a T.

“You’re shitting me.”

“Swear to god. Around finals last year, I try to hit him up for some, right? And he looks at me like I’m slow and says he doesn’t have any—he doesn’t smoke pot. Then he goes, all put upon, 'Why are people always asking  _ me _ ?’” His voice had shifted into a quiet mutter for the last, a rough approximation of Jonathan’s sound.

Billy snorted and bumped his shoulder into Steve’s as they passed through a doorway between halls. “You sure he wasn’t just holding out on you?”

Steve bumped him back and turned the motion into a shrug. “I don’t know, man. He doesn’t seem the bogarting type.” A small smile had worked its way onto his face at some point and wouldn’t seem to leave, in spite of the nerves generating a slight but unrelenting queasiness in his gut.

Before too long, they reached the target locker at the ass-end of the social studies hall, and Billy wasted no time in zipping through the combination, opening it, and proceeding to rifle through it.

Neil had started making random spot-checks of the Camaro since Billy’s birthday, perhaps because he reasonably assumed Billy might run off the first chance he got. Billy had been extremely lucky during the first instance, and he’d taken to stashing in his locker, for the time being, anything that he couldn’t risk his father finding. Steve probably would’ve offered up a more secure location, if only he’d had one; stashing decidedly woman-less porn, along with who knew what else, in his mom’s Beemer or in a room subjected to a housekeeper’s attention would’ve just been tempting fate.

Leaning back against the neighboring lockers and shooting quick looks up and down the empty hallway, Steve shoved his hands in his pockets and let his elbows roll out away from himself and then back, out and then back, out and then back.

The moment had seemed like an ideal choice when the thought hit earlier in the day (right after  _ ‘Ah, I’ll have to let Billy know there’s a search coming’ _ ), and it stretched out before Steve now—it was rare that they were alone enough to speak freely but not enough to hastily end up all over each other like they always did nowadays, with Steve letting Billy’s mouth distract him and chase away any intent of starting a tough conversation. Now the moment was here and still Steve chewed at his lip and let his elbows roll.

It felt like both an eternity and the blink of an eye before Billy was closing the door with a clang, a black plastic bag loaded with the locker’s more questionable contents in hand.

Faced with the choice of acting fast or losing his perfect opportunity, Steve breathed deep, turned his head toward Billy, and forced himself to speak up before either of them could move to leave.

“So! Uh, graduation’s getting close, kinda into the final stretch now, and I know we haven’t really talked much about, um,  _ us, _ but I was thinking…” He’d let the words out in a nervous, stumbling rush, but they’d trailed off as he watched the other go abruptly still and then hang his head.

When Billy looked back up a moment later, turning his body to face Steve and cocking his hip to the side, his face was neutral, controlled. He mirrored Steve by shoving his fingers in his pockets, but he let his thumbs hang out to twitch against his belt loops.

“You don’t gotta say it, Harrington. I get it. 'We had a good run, but all good things… yadda yadda.'”

Steve’s mouth flapped silently for a moment.  _ “'A good run’? _ What— Billy, I’m not  _ breaking up _ with you. Why would you thi—”

The dull expression on Billy’s face cracked with a furrowing of his brow, though his mouth was still tight. “Just figured from the beginning that this… _ thing _ we have going was never gonna be long-term.”

Steve’s jaw snapped shut. “Wait, are  _ you _ breaking up with  _ me _ now?”

“No!” Billy’s eyes had abruptly gone wide and his shoulders were climbing noticeably toward his ears. For a hysterical split-second, Steve pictured a turtle with Billy’s hair trying to pull its head into its shell. “Just—it was clear back then that you still weren’t over Little Miss Princess, and, I mean, it’s not like you can enjoy the whole courtship song and dance with  _ me _ in fucking Hawkins. Figured you were just looking for something casual 'til you fucked off to Duke or Stanford or wherever.”

Steve broke out of his apprehension enough to let out a snort. “You really think I’m getting into Stanford with grades like mine?”

Billy shrugged defensively. “I’ve got eyes, Harrington. Mommy and Daddy aren’t exactly hard up for cash, right? That’s been known to smooth the way somewhat from time to time.”

“Yeah, well, not this time. I’m not going to college, Billy.”

A few years back, Steve had struggled a little with the word ‘incredulous.’ Now, he had a feeling he’d eternally associate it with the face Billy made right that instant.

_ “You, Steve Harrington, _ not going to college? What did Mommy and Daddy have to say about that?”

_ “My parents,” _ Steve corrected insistently, “weren’t too pleased at first, but they got over it. Last year, I got it in my head that I’d just work for my dad for a while after graduation, so of course now they’ve got it in  _ their _ heads, but, ah—a lot’s changed since then.”

Uncertainty had been building steadily on Billy’s face, and now he seemed more hesitant than Steve had ever seen him. “So where  _ are _ you headed to, once you’re done here?”

Steve swallowed. “I was kinda thinking that depended on you.”

“Huh.”

The syllable was flat, emotionless, nothing Steve could glean anything from, so he studied Billy’s face instead. It could’ve just been the way the afternoon sun shined through the hallway windows, but he thought Billy’s eyes were taking on a slight, suspiciously watery-looking gleam.

Steve’s heart leapt, but he kept his voice low. “That sound okay?”

Billy gave a jerky, one-shouldered shrug and looked off to the side. “Sure. Yeah, I guess.”

Steve managed to maintain some semblance of composure and resist the urge to punch the air in victory, but it was a near thing. He darted a quick glance over Billy’s shoulder and then back over his own and stepped closer.

Smoothly, gently, he reached up to nudge Billy’s chin forward and pressed a short, firm kiss to his lips. As he stepped back, he felt a grin, the kind Billy always insisted were ‘goofy’ or made him ‘look like a doofus,’ break across his face and whispered, “Good.”

Billy ducked his head and shook it absently, but this time Steve could see he was smiling and hear his low, disbelieving chuckle. The guy didn’t do bashful very often, but Steve savored every instance.

He prodded Billy’s boot with the toe of his sneaker. “Maybe we can talk stuff out later at my place?”

When Billy rolled his head back up to face him, he gave Steve a full view of the earnest, slightly crooked smile on his face. “Sounds like a plan. You got beer, right?”

“You bet.”

Billy nudged Steve’s shoulder with his own again as he moved to start back down the hallway. “C’mon,“ he said, "Let’s get out of here.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you enjoyed this particular oneshot of mine, please go check out [this lovely piece](http://flippyspoon.tumblr.com/post/170933950881/38-or-47-or-66) by the incomparable [flippyspoon](http://archiveofourown.org/users/flippyspoon/pseuds/flippyspoon) (if you somehow haven't already). Though I churned out the bulk of mine a few months ago as some of my first writing for the fandom, I was quite slow in finishing and posting it, and flippy's work was written and posted in the meantime; seeing as the two ended up sharing the same basic premise and a few similar beats by coincidence (though setting, tone, and overall execution differ pretty significantly), I feel some acknowledgement here is due.
> 
> Come find me on tumblr: [@netherooze](http://netherooze.tumblr.com/) ;D


	2. First Attempt, Stuffed in Locker (Epistolary)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Billy has written Steve an honest-to-god apology card—or at least he's tried to. (The author's epistolary art project. Image descriptions included.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Image descriptions below (which may also prove useful for anyone with an aversion to deciphering handwriting).

  
  
  
  


 

Image Descriptions

IMAGE 1 - GALLERY LABEL:

 **William Hargrove** (b. 1967)  
**_First Attempt, Stuffed in Locker,_ ** 1984  
Ink and Colored Pencil on Paper

 

IMAGE 2 - Photograph of FRONT OF CARD (Done in a traditional American tattoo art and lettering style):

[Drawn upper banner, reading "SORRY FOR"]  
[Drawing of a bloody fist]  
[Drawn lower banner, reading "BEATING YOUR FACE IN"]

 

IMAGE 3 - Photograph of INSIDE OF CARD (In only somewhat scrawling handwriting, with a few small ink transfers here and there and a left-handed slant creeping in in the postscript):

Harrington,

Getting up to shady shit with a bunch of kids and then lying to my face about it was kind of asking for an ass kicking, but I admit the one I gave you may have been a (slightly) disproportionate response.

Hope the concussion wasn't too bad.

The face is looking better already, so don't worry, broads’ll be throwing themselves at you again in no time. (If they aren't already—lucky for you, pull off the battle-damaged look pretty well. The bruises make you look like less of a yuppie.)

-BH

PS - Just a thought: next time you feel like practicing your child abduction skills, maybe have 'em call their folks first and, you know, avoid actual kidnapping.

Also, all the moping after Wheeler was pathetic to begin with, but now it’s just excessive. Past time to get back on the horse and rejoin the living, dude. Friendly reminder that Chapman’s kegger on Friday is looking like it won’t actually suck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come find me on tumblr: [@netherooze](http://netherooze.tumblr.com/) ;D


	3. Bits & Pieces (Drabble Collection)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A collection of five standalone drabbles:  
> • Steve is just a little slow on the uptake, but he figures it's better late than never, right?  
> • Billy supposes graduation won't be as much of a drag as it could be, since at least he'll have Steve there with him. As it turns out, Steve isn't all he has.  
> • The boys establish their first holiday tradition, but not without putting their own spin on a classic.  
> • Neil Hargrove receives some mail. One particular envelope sticks out among the bills and advertisements.  
> • Steve finds that, under the right circumstances, he really doesn't mind taking direction. (NSFW)

Slow on the Uptake

In their last semester at Hawkins High, Billy and Steve develop a bit of an understanding between them, which then becomes an odd but treasured friendship—but that's all. Steve has picked up on implications from some of Billy's stories that the guy isn't entirely straight, and he’s made sure to be the nonchalant, unfazed kind of supportive, because Steve hasn't been That Kind of Asshole since Nancy.

They go their separate ways over the summer, Billy back to school in California on a scholarship and Steve to the OK school closer to home that he ended up applying to after all, with casual promises to keep in touch. Steve is still surprised when he gets the first postcard from Billy. He's also unreasonably happy about it; he's been, unsurprisingly, lonely since he left for school, and for all that he hated living in that empty house, he misses Hawkins. Misses his weird monster-fighting family. Misses Billy, more than he thought he would. He writes a postcard back.

It's while trying to stave off the loneliness at a campus party that he has his first undeniably non-platonic encounter with another guy, and he realizes that not only did he like it, he's surprisingly OK with the fact that he did. Soon after, he finds himself thinking of Billy and then stopping to _really_ think about Billy—about how Billy makes him feel—and then letting out a quiet _"Oh."_

The next time he writes to Billy, it's a letter tucked into an envelope away from prying eyes instead of a postcard. Billy had intended to find a place to stay put during breaks between semesters, but, after the letter and the ones that follow, he and Steve may just end up making other plans.  


  


* * *

  
Seeds

Billy makes a bit of an effort to patch things up with Max after that night at the Byers's, but things are still pretty stilted and weird between them by the time the school year ends.

He doesn't expect anybody to be there at graduation for him, since Neil's made it clear he won't be attending, he figures Susan will just go along with what Neil does, and Max wouldn't go by herself even if she did have the slightest interest in attending.

He's standing around by himself for a minute after the ceremony, Steve's parents having pulled him away temporarily, when Max steps out from the crowd and walks up to offer a hesitant "Hey. Congrats, I guess." (He'll find out later that she caught a ride with Mrs. Byers, Will, and Dustin.)

Billy just stares at her silently for a minute and feels his eyes do that glassy thing he hates. She watches him right back before purposefully striding forward and enveloping him in a stiff hug. After a moment, Billy rests one hand on her shoulder blades and pats her head a few times with the other, and he catches Steve smiling at him from over where he's still making nice with his parents.

He tells Steve that he'll catch him later that evening, and Billy and Max go to grab a bite to eat and just hang out together for the first time in years.  


  


* * *

  
Tradition

When Billy spots a hanging bundle of mistletoe during their first Christmas together, he doesn’t take immediate advantage of it.

Instead, he reaches up and plucks off a sprig of it while Steve’s back is turned. Then, he waits until there aren’t any mirrors around and stealthily sticks it in Steve’s hair. He’s picked the perfect spot, he thinks, just out of the path Steve’s hand always follows when absently pushing his hair back, and he’s got it lodged in there pretty well. Inordinately pleased with himself, Billy uses his new excuse to lay quick kisses on his clueless boyfriend at every opportunity, to the point that it starts earning him slightly puzzled looks and eventually Steve says something.

“Not that I’m complaining, but this is getting kind of excessive—is something up, or…?”

Billy just grins at him like a little shit and goes _“Nah, I’m good”_ and waits for Steve to figure it out.

When he finally does, upon catching sight of himself in a bathroom mirror about an hour later, he goes to find Billy and holds up the offending leaf with a _“Really?”_ that tries for exasperated but just comes out fond. Billy smirks and makes to grab for it, but Steve pulls it back out of reach and offers a quick, mollifying kiss of his own. “Nope, I’m holding onto this,” Steve says.

And he does. He stashes it in the back of a drawer for an entire year before retrieving it and surreptitiously _(like a goddamn ninja)_ planting it in Billy’s hair the following Christmas.  


  


* * *

  
Might’ve Been

70-year-old Neil Hargrove doesn't receive mail very often, aside from the usual array of bills, account statements, and advertisements. His brow furrows behind his reading glasses when, one day, he receives a hand-addressed envelope made of thick, expensive paper with no return address. He sets the rest of the mail stack aside on the little table beside his chair.

After tearing the envelope open with mildly arthritic fingers, he pulls out the card inside and finds that it's a wedding announcement—and his first communication from his son in decades. His face tightens as he stares for a moment at the card, at the names and the little ampersand between them all printed in a flowing script. He flips the card over, but there's no personalization anywhere, no handwritten addendum on either side, just the formal text of the announcement.

He feels something still inside the envelope slip from one end to the other, and he digs his fingers back in to pull out a small photograph. In the picture, his son, now undeniably into middle age, and another man direct matching smiles at each other. His son's face is loving, happy and open in a way Neil never saw it once his first wife passed. It occurs to him that, if it weren't for Billy's facial expression, the father/son resemblance between them would be more apparent in this photo than it ever was years ago.

His forearms drop down to the armrests of his chair, the envelope, card, and photograph held loosely in his dangling hands, and he stares at the beige wall as his thoughts slide back to other places, other times. It's a good while before he moves again.  


  


* * *

  
Match (NSFW)

_“You were moving your feet—plant them next time. Draw a charge.”_

Those were the first instructions Billy gave him, his voice low in both pitch and volume (not quite a whisper, but close, meant for only Steve to hear).

Other commands have come in between then and now, harsher or more public or both, but it’s that first instance that comes to mind at the moment.

“Longer strokes. Angle higher—” The briefest interruption of a hitched breath. “ _There_ you go.”

Billy directs him almost coolly, like they’re still on the court instead of in Steve’s bedroom, like he isn’t stuffed full of Steve’s cock or pressed into the bed by the weight of Steve’s body or held spread open by the strength of Steve’s arms.

Steve feels that the motions of Billy’s hand remain steady, leisurely teasing his own cock with his knuckles pressing into Steve’s abdomen, when he continues: “Okay now, time to pick up the pace a little.”

Steve opens his eyes and raises them to Billy’s face, squinting a little in an effort to keep sweat from dripping into his eyes as he follows the direction. In the sight that greets him, there’s no teasing smirk or wagging tongue to be found, not right now. Right now, there are just parted lips and damp curls and flushed skin and an intent blue gaze that’s riveted squarely on Steve.

“You’re doing great so far, Harrington.”

Steve’s heart hammers and he returns the gaze as long as he can bear to, biting his lip before giving in. He lunges forward a little—the hands he has under Billy’s knees pushing those solid thighs back and folding Billy’s body even further so he can reach—and lets his own lower lip slip from between his teeth so he can replace it with Billy’s. A brief nibble, a light tug, and he frees that plump lip to seal their mouths and let their tongues tangle together instead.

Billy eventually breaks the kiss to resume murmuring instructions into the miniscule space between them. “A little harder… A _little_ harder… Good.” The last word comes out breathless, framed between little gasps. “ _Good_ ,” he repeats, and it’s a pleased groan this time.

The motions of Billy’s hand finally grow jerky and desperate against Steve’s stomach, and Steve lets his eyes fall closed once more to savor the little victory.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Come find me on tumblr: [@netherooze](http://netherooze.tumblr.com/) ;D


	4. An Observation (Oneshot)

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Steve is comfortably certain that Billy Hargrove detests everything about him. Someone a little more insightful makes a (disturbingly solid) case for an alternate theory.

Though he’d had the walk to the cafeteria, the time spent waiting to pay for his food, and the walk to the table to cool down, Steve was still fuming when he sat down across from Nancy and Jonathan with his lunch tray, the now-dried evidence of a certain blond asshole’s classroom experiment still splashed down his front.

Nancy’s brows furrowed as she looked him over. “Is everything okay? What happened to your shirt?”

On his way to the lunchroom, Steve had told himself that he was _not_ going to vent his frustration on innocent bystanders, dammit, but those questions were all it took to send the sarcastic flippancy tumbling out. “Oh, no big deal, just a little spill in Biology. Everything’s just fine!” He stabbed his fork into his salad a bit harder than he needed to.

When he was only met with continuing silence, he looked up to find two faces eyeing him with concern. He sighed, deflating a little. After making a quick visual check to be sure a certain someone wasn’t in the vicinity, he slumped a little more.

“Sorry, Hargrove's just got me at the end of my damn rope.” He ran a hand through his hair. “He laid off for a while after That Night, but now he's right back at it.”

Nancy's expression turned sympathetic, but Jonathan just seemed preoccupied all of a sudden, his eyes dropping to the table. When he raised them again, he seemed to be hesitating on the edge of saying something.

Steve gave a questioning quirk of his eyebrows. Jonathan pinned him with a heavy stare for another moment before he finally spoke.

“He likes you, you know.”

Steve blinked.

“What?”

Jonathan leaned a little bit closer. “He _likes_ you. He kind of...lights up, almost, whenever he spots you somewhere, like he’s bored all the time and only really engaged when you’re around—”

“ _Ha._ Yeah, probably because he’s looking forward to giving me hell—”

“—and if he’s sitting or standing still, he always stays turned so he’s facing you—”

“He’s probably fucking watching for weaknesses, or a chance to make fun of me—or he’s afraid I’m gonna try something to get revenge for the damn concussion if he turns his back.”

“— _and_ he always stares at your ass when he thinks no one will notice,” Jonathan finished, fixing Steve with a flat look.

Steve’s mouth moved soundlessly for a moment, and his stomach hitched a little. Okay, _that_ was a little harder to dismiss.

“He does?”

His thoughts were quickly devolving into a loop of ‘ _Billy Hargrove_ stares at my ass—Billy Hargrove _enjoys_ staring at my ass.’ A dangerous new thought was just starting to join the circle (‘...does he stare at my ass in the _shower_?’) when Jonathan's voice snapped him out of it.

“At least three times that I’ve seen, yeah.”

Steve’s hands came up a little and dropped back down in an involuntary shrug. “How the hell do you notice all this?”

Jonathan sighed. “He’s kind of a loud guy, Steve, and if he’s not talking _to_ you, a lot of the time he’s talking _about_ you. Loudly. After I heard _Tommy H._ crack and ask if they could change the subject already, I kind of had a hunch. Then I just kept an eye out to see if I was right.”

Nancy seemed to be devoting intense concentration to the matter. Steve had seen her make the same face when she was trying to decide on a thesis for an essay. “It would kind of explain a lot, actually. Going by what you’ve said before, Steve.”

After pausing a moment to consider (the wicked grins, the weird backhanded compliments that always left Steve floundering, that damn _tongue_ ), Steve had to privately agree with her.

When the quiet had stretched over the table a little too long, Nancy eventually got the conversation rolling again between them, smoothly steering it to more inane topics. They continued on that way until the bell rang, and the three of them got up to head to class, one question still weighing inescapably on Steve's mind.

He couldn’t just take Jonathan’s word for it and call it a day, not with something like this, but he was definitely going to be paying extra attention now so he could form his own conclusion. Assuming Jonathan was right, though, what would Steve _do_ with the knowledge—the knowledge that Billy Hargrove fucking _liked_ him—once he’d confirmed it?

His thoughts continued to race as they made their way quietly down the hallway. They reached Nancy’s destination first, and she aimed one last sympathetic look Steve’s way, one he now read as _‘Good luck with your Billy problem.’_ Steve glanced away when she moved to Jonathan to share a quick goodbye and a brief peck of a kiss.

Once Nancy had disappeared into her classroom, Jonathan turned back to Steve, making no move to resume the trip to their own classes. His eyes darted around for a second while his lips pressed into a hard line and then suddenly that heavy look was back. When he spoke, his voice was quiet, charged. “Look, I know the guy's a total asshole, but if you're gonna give him shit about liking guys, just forget I said anything. Please.”

Steve was taken aback for a moment. He realized that a dark little part of him had been relishing the possibility—the idea of just having _something_ he could hold over Hargrove for once should he want to (even if he never actually _would_ , at least not at this point in his life)—and felt immediately guilty.

He swallowed. “I wouldn’t do that. I—I know I said shit before that I shouldn’t have, but there’s a lot of stuff I did that I wouldn’t now. You know that, right?” His hands moved helplessly at his sides. “Still sorry about that, and the other shit, by the way.”

“I know,” Jonathan said. He stared assessingly at Steve a little longer and then nodded to himself, dropping his gaze and turning to continue down the hall. They really had to hurry at this point, or else they’d be late getting to class.

A minute later, they'd reached the point where their routes diverged. With a casual wave and a nod of acknowledgement, they split up to head down different hallways, and Steve was left alone to try to somehow focus on English. He doubted he'd have much luck, though, when recollections of the sharp, persistent focus in Hargrove's eyes—the spark of heat in them, always aimed right at Steve—were swimming through his mind before he'd even reached his desk.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Since Hawkins High students apparently take Chemistry sophomore year, let's pretend they have Physics as juniors and Biology as seniors. (Shhh, just go with it.)
> 
> Come find me on tumblr: [@netherooze](http://netherooze.tumblr.com/) ;D

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you for reading! Hope you've enjoyed some of my humble contributions to the beautiful subfandom we've got going here. Wishing all the best to every one of you—the abundance of kindness, talent, and overall loveliness in our little Harringrove family is frankly astounding, and I'm delighted just surrounding myself with the lot of you.


End file.
